Ochi Projects is pleased to present We are never going to be the same, an online viewing room featuring recent works by Young Joo Lee. Research, personal histories, mythologies, and current events are overlapped and integrated into Lee’s nonlinear narrative time-based works. Her experiences as an immigrant, a woman, and a scholar guide her artistic inquiries as she tackles individual perspectives on issues as diverse as the cultural coercions of gender, the misuses of language in the context of migration, and the influence of capitalism on love and reproduction, among other things. We are never going to be the same features a collection of the artist’s recent drawings, exhibited alongside two animations and an interactive video game.

Magic Kingdom (2020) is a web-based video game Lee built using Unity, a cross-platform game engine. The game features rows of “Success by Trump”—an actual Eau de Toilette available for purchase on Amazon.com. A player moves around a dystopic graveyard-like landscape comprised of rows of Success towards a Trump tower looming in the distance. Knocking over bottles reveals real Amazon reviews, such as “THREE STARS: This stuff is ok,” “FIVE STARS: Compliments from strangers!” or “TWO STARS: Scent fais [sic] to linger.”

Black Snow (2019 / 2021) is a digital animation that incorporates archival newsreel footage from the 67 atomic tests conducted in the Marshall Islands between 1946-58. Though the indigenous populations in the vicinity were informed of the tests, there was no indication of the dangerous and lasting effects to people and the environment. Personal anecdotes described people eating the nuclear fallout as it floated from the sky like snow. A whispering voice narrates from U.S. government documents and oral histories, peppered with poetic reflection and affective repetition as the camera slowly pans through landscapes of destroyed paradise and poisoned communities.

Jaguar’s Vision (2021) is a digital animation that begins with men of different races working together to kill a jaguar in the jungle. By the light of a fire animal parts are divided—a commodification of a natural resource—as each individual tries on the jaguar’s hollowed and hallowed head. Four visions of hallucinogenic desire and the comforts of modern living appear—manipulations from the spirit of the jaguar or precognitions of human greed—cause the men to fight for the right to dominate nature and the others. This contemporary parable, conceptualized amongst the anxieties of pandemic isolation, suggests that harmony in collaborative domination can only lead to competition and ultimate destruction.

Lee’s time-based works toggle between absurdity and reality as each story unfolds, embracing juxtaposed sound, language, and image to sculpt a unique horror aesthetic. The stories that Lee tells are uncomfortable and existential, often beginning with singular images and scripts. Removed from a linear context, her drawings and sculptures are moody and meditative. Lee critiques societal oppressions attached to the habits of domination, colonization, and destruction and invites viewers to reconsider the metrics used to define power, success, and what is normal.

Young Joo Lee (b. Seoul, Korea) holds an MFA in Sculpture from Yale University and an MFA in Film from the Academy of Fine Arts Städelschule Frankfurt. Lee is currently a Visiting Lecturer in Animation at the Department of Art, Film, and Visual Studies at Harvard University. Lee has been the recipient of various awards and grants including a Seoul Foundation for the Arts and Culture Artist Grant (2020), a College Fellowship in Media Practice at Harvard University (2018-20), a Fulbright Scholarship in Film & Digital Media (2015-18), and a DAAD artist scholarship (2010-12). Her work has been exhibited in national and international institutions and film/video festivals with exhibitions forthcoming at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (2021) and Post Territory Ujeongguk (2021), both in Seoul, South Korea.